Image series 10 / 2020: Tenochtitlán

Capital of the Aztecs

1 March 2020
|
By: Bettina Pfleging

In the middle of Lake Texcoco, surrounded by high mountains on several artificial islands and connected to the mainland by three dams, was the capital of the Aztec empire Tenochtitlán, founded in 1345. It was a big city with temples, palaces and precisely ordered residential areas with kitchen gardens. When Hernán Cortés and his companions reached the Aztec capital Tenochtitlán on 8 November 1519, it was one of the largest cities in the world at that time with a population of around 200,000.
On the occasion of the 500th anniversary of the landing of the Spanish conqueror Hernán Cortés in the Gulf of Mexico, the national exhibition opens a new, in-depth look at the culture of the Aztecs.